"The esoteric element was more prominent in the 'Red' Masonry than in the 'Blue'.
But Red or Scottish Masonry can also be seen as a return to more
traditional ideas of hierarchy and social order....But the Scottish
higher degrees meant the implied rejection of at least a part of the
ideal of egalitarianism. The higher grades involved the subordination
of the lower, and also the ignorance on the part of the lower grades of
the wisdom enjoyed by the higher." - Peter Partner, The Murdered Magicians

"To affect their pro-Stuart political aims, the Scottish lodges changed
the Biblical symbolism of the third Blue Degree into political
symbolism to represent the House of Stuart. Ramsey's 'higher' degrees
contained additional symbolism 'revealing' why Freemasons had a duty to
help the Stuarts against the throne of England. Because of this, many
people viewed Scottish Freemasonry as a clever attempt to lure
freemasons away from the Mother Grand Lodge system which supported the
Hanoverian monarchy and turn the new converts into pro-Stuart Masons."The
Stuarts themselves joined Ramsey's organization. James III adopted the
Templar title 'Chevalier St. George'. His son, Charles Edward, was
initiated into the Order of Knights Templar on Setember 24, 1745, the
same year in which he led a major Jacobite invasion of Scotland. Two
years later, on April 15, 1747, Charles Edward established a masonic
'Scottish Jacobite Chapter' in the French city of Arras." - William Bramley, The Gods of Eden

"We, Charles Edward, King of
England, France, Scotland, and Ireland, and as such Substitute Grand
Master of the Chapter of H., known by the title of Knight of the Eagle
and Pelican..." - Arras Lodge Charter

During their stay in France in 1745, the "Young Pretender" Bonnie
Prince Charlie and other Stuarts "had become deeply involved in the
dissemination of Freemasonry. Indeed they are generally regarded as the
source of the particular form of Freemasonry known as 'Scottish Rite'.
'Scottish Rite' Freemasonry introduced higher degrees than those
offered by other Masonic systems at the time. It promised initiation
into greater and more profound mysteries - mysteries supposedly
preserved and handed down in Scotland. It established more direct
connections between Freemasonry and the various activities - alchemy,
Cabalism and Hermetic thought, for instance - which were regarded as 'Rosecrucian'. And it elaborated not only on the antiquity but also on the illustrious pedigree of the 'craft'."

"...It did not, like many rites of Freemasonry, consist primarily of
free-thinkers and atheists. On the contrary, it seems to have been
deeply religious and magically oriented - emphasizing a sacred social
and political hierarchy, a divine order, an underlying cosmic plan. And
the upper grades or degrees of this Freemasonry, according to M.
Chaumeil [Le Tresor du triangle d'or] were the lower grades or degrees
of the Prieure de Sion." - Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail

"In the aftermath of the 1745 rebellion, Jacobite Freemasonry as such,
with its specific political orientation and allegiance to the Stuart
bloodline, effectively died out. Variations of it, however, purged of
political content and tempered by the moderation of the Grand Lodge of
England, survived. They survived in part through the so-called 'higher'
degrees' offered by such institutions as Irish Grand Lodge. Most
important, however, they survived within the Strict Observance
promulgated by Hund - of which the highest degree was that of 'Knight
Templar'. The Strict Observance was to spread throughout Europe." - Baigent & Leigh, The Temple and the Lodge

"The rite in its present form of thirty-three degrees was reorganized at the end of the eighteenth century by some half dozen Masonic adventurers at Charleston, South Carolina." - Charles Sotheran (1877)

The Ancient Accepted Scottish Rite (AASR) "is an appendant body of
Masonry, meaning that it is not part of the Blue Lodge per se, but
closely associated with Masonry. It requires that a man be a Master
Mason before joining the Scottish Rite. The Scottish Rite confers the
4th through 32nd degrees. The degree work may be, but is not
necessarily, completed at one time. Any Master Mason is eligible to
join the Scottish Rite. The degrees of the Scottish Rite continue the
symbolism of the first three Masonic degrees."
"The Scottish Rite awards a special honorary degree, the 33rd, to those
it feels has made an outstanding contribution to Masonry, the community
as a whole, and to mankind. There is no way to 'achieve' this degree or
'take' it, in the sense that one takes the 4th through 32nd degrees in
the Scottish Rite. It is a singular honor, rarely bestowed, and greatly
admired." - Andrew Fabbro, "Freemasonry FAQ" Version 1.2

"Scottish Rite Masonry has almost a million members in America...""In one jurisdiction, the Scottish Rite Mason is made a 'Knight Kadosh'. Kadosh
is direct from the Hebrew, and means 'holy'. The 'Holy Knight' of this
degree is the Knight Templar. The story of the final days of Grand
Master Jacques de Molay,
along with a brief history of the Templar order, is recounted to the
candidate for the degree. The spirit of the degree is to call upon the
initiate to be aware of, and to resolutely oppose, all forms of
personal and religious injustice." - John J. Robinson, Dungeon, Fire and Sword (1991)

"The birthplace of Templarism was Germany, where the egalitarian and
rationalist thrust of Freemasonry was resisted by an old-fashioned and
rank-dominated society, and there was a demand for a version of the
Masonic craft acceptable to conservative doctrine and Gothic taste.
During the Seven Years War a French prisoner in Germany co-operated
with a German pastor who went under the name of Samuel Rosa to concoct
a Templar myth to serve the ritual needs of the Masonic lodges.""According
to their story the Grand Masters of the Order had been in possession of
special spiritual illumination deriving from the Jewish sect of the Essenes.
This had passed through the control of the Canons of the Holy Sepulcher
at Jerusalem, and had gone thence to the Order of the Temple. Jacques
de Molay, the last Grand Master, was by these story-writers given the
Masonic name of Hiram, which according to Masonic lore had been the name of the murdered builder of the Temple of Solomon."

"The idea of vengeance to be exacted for a wronged and murdered magus
was embedded in orthodox Masonic lore in the form of the myth of the
murder of the Temple-builder, Hiram, and of the despatch by Solomon of
chosen masters to avenge his death. There was originally no particular
political context for this supposed murder and its atonement, though
the paraphernalia of swords, skeletons, and decapitated dolls which was
used in some lodges to represent the events was already alarming
enough.""The
idea of the Masonic 'grades of vengeance' was that certain enlightened
persons, each step in enlightenment being the object of a 'grade', were
formally committed to avenge the sacrilegious murder of the
Temple-builder, Hiram. The thirtieth grade, for example, was that of
the 'Knight Kadosch', who played at being the medieval Justiciar or
Chief Justice. If Hiram was to be identified with Jacques de Molay,
certain Masonic Templar knights could be regarded as pledged to revenge
the Order on the French monarchy."

"The most successful organizer of German
Templarism, who came for a time close to controlling the whole
apparatus of German Freemasonry, was Karl Gotthelf von Hund,
a substantial landowner in north-east Electoral Saxony. Hund was very
different from the self-seeking charlatans such as Johnson and Rosa; he
was much more of a self-deluded fanatic, said to have gone through life
almost like a sleepwalker. He had begun his Masonic studies in France,
and at about the same time as the invention of the other Templar myths
he had produced his own.""At the summit of Hund's organization
stood an authority which could never be identified, that of the
'Unknown Superiors'. To these mysterious and in fact non-existent
persons Hund demanded complete and unquestioning obedience, especially
as regards the delivery of scientific information about alchemical
operations. Hund appears genuinely to have believed that the Young
Pretender was the Unknown head of his Order, and though, erroneously,
that he had met him when he had himself been 'professed' or initiated
in France. In fact, so far as is known, the Young Pretender was unaware
of Hund's existence, and the Comte de Clermonot in France, to whom Hund
also professed obedience, seems to have paid no more attention to him. - Peter Partner, The Murdered Magicians

As a further extension to the "Scottish Rite", the "Strict Observance"
demanded "an oath of unswerving, unquestioning obedience to the
mysterious 'unknown superiors'. And the basic tenet of the 'Strict
Observance' was that it had descended directly from the Knights
Templar, some of whom had purportedly survived the purge of 1307-14 and
perpetuated their Order in Scotland." - Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail

"In 1782 [the Duke of] Brunswick decided to solve his doubts by holding
a final Conference or Convent of the Order at Wilhelmsbad, near Hanau
in Hessen. True to its aristocratic origins, the last gathering of the
Strict Observance was a blue-blooded affair. But disillusion and decay
were patent. The successively unveiled mysteries of the Order had
yielded nothing but boring ritual; the alchemists had made no
discoveries, the Templar lands would never be returned. No one expected
to identify the long-concealed Unknown Superiors. The thirst for
mystical illumination remained, but hope of quenching it at the Templar
spring was over." - Peter Partner, The Murdered Magicians

appeared in Germany, both of these works being contributions to the establishment of a philosophic government upon the earth." - Manly P. Hall, Rosicrucian and Masonic Origins pp. 408-409

Mayer Anschel "Rothschild made a fortune from various activities while
serving under William IX. The French Revolution and the wars it
triggered created many shortages throughout the Hesse. Rothschild
capitalized in this situation by sharply raising the prices of the
cloth he was importing from England. Rothschild also struck a deal with
another of William IX's chief financial agents, Carl Buderus. The deal
enabled Rothschild to share in the profits from the leasing of Hessian
mercenaries to England.""According
to Jacob Katz, writing in his book, Jews and Freemasons in Europe,
1723-1939, the Rothschilds were one of the rich and powerful Frankfurt
families appearing on a Masonic membership list in 1811.""Special Jewish lodges were created, such as the 'Melchizedek'
lodges named in honor of the Old Testament priest-king...Those who
belonged to the Melchizedek lodges were said to be members of the
'Order of Melchizedek'." - William Bramley, The Gods of Eden

"In 1738 Pope Clement XII issued a Papal Bull condemning and
excommunicating all Freemasons, whom he pronounced 'enemies of the
Roman Church'....In its text the pope declares that Masonic thought
rests on a heresy...- the denial of Jesus's divinity. And he further
asserts that the guiding spirits, the 'masterminds', behind Freemasonry
are the same as those who provoked the Lutheran Reformation." - Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The Holy Blood and the Holy Grail

"In 1740, the Grand Master of the Order of Malta caused the Bull of
Pope Clement XII. to be published in that island, and forbade the
meetings of the Freemasons. On this occasion several Knights and many
citizens left the island; and in 1741, the Inquisition persecuted the
Freemasons at Malta. The Grand Master proscribed their assemblies under
severe penalties, and six Knights were banished from the island in
perpetuity for having assisted at a meeting." - Commander Gourdin,

"Citizens of Northwestern New York acted swiftly in 1826 when they heard the news that William Morgan
had disappeared. Morgan, described by an historian of politics as "a
somewhat down at heel citizen of Batavia," was a disgruntled Mason who
had written a book alleged to be an expose' of Masonic secrets. Rumors
contended that the Masons had murdered Morgan. The Order, for its part,
maintained a stolid and uncooperative silence, and so local political
organizations campaigned to keep support from office- seeking Masons.
One new organization, the Anti-Masonry Party, attracted those in the
populace who distrusted the Masons and other secret societies. It grew
almost overnight, and the party's power base soon stretched from
western New York to Pennsylvania, Ohio, New Jersey, Massachusetts, and
Vermont.

"In the rush of growth of the anti-Masonic movement, the initiating
impetus for it was submerged, and neither the fate of Morgan nor the
culpability of the Masonic Order was ascertained. Instead, the new and
liberal Anti-Masonry Party became the voice of the poorer citizen
against the well-to-do (and most Masons were regarded as rich), the
spokesman for the orthodox against Unitarianism and other liberal
sects, a supporter of temperance and anti-slavery activities, and a
cheerleader for some features of Jacksonian Democracy against the
autocratic Federalists. It opposed not only secret societies and
government-in-secret, but also imprisonment for debt and drafts for
state militia service.
"But as the party gathered strength it also began to move from the
'left' to the 'right', supporting tariffs on imported goods to prevent
the collapse of local industries, better canals for more efficient
transport, and banks free from regulatory taxes. As such, it was vainly
used by politicians for their own ends, chiefly anti-Jacksonian:
Thurlow Weed and William H. Seward tried unsuccessfully through the
Anti-Masonry Party to overthrow Martin van Buren's Albany Regency
(informal group of Democratic leaders in New York), and politician Thad
Stevens in Pennsylvania tried to use it to increase his power. Soon the
new party was voting with the National Republican Party against the
Jacksonians; by 1834 it had moved entirely to the 'right', for it
helped found the reactionary Whig Party, which absorbed the
Anti-Masonry Party in 1836." - Brian Francis Redman ("The Big C")

"By the 1880s eight Popes had already condemned Freemasonry when
Freemasons urged that these condemnations had been based on erroneous
information and were excessively severe. This led Pope Leo XIII to issue his famous encyclical Humanum Genus
in 1884. Leo XIII classed Freemasonry as a grouping of secret societies
in the 'kingdom of Satan' and, like the Greek Orthodox Church half a
century later, stated that it wished 'to bring back after eighteen
centuries the manners and customs of the pagans.'" - Stephen Knight, The Brotherhood

"There was nothing nefarious or subversive on the pope's part, Leo XIII
was a troubled man. He felt deeply the great losses in church power,
privilege, and wealth brought on by the democratic revolutions and
developed such profound mistrust that he kept all of the gold of the
Vatican in a box under his own bed. He truly believed democracy was
evil, part of the 'kingdom of Satan', and that the Catholic church had
a right and duty to oversee every secular government." - John J. Robinson, Born in Blood

"The principles of social science
follow. Here naturalists teach that men have all the same rights, and
are perfectly equal in condition; that every man is naturally
independent; that no one has a right to command other; that it is
tyranny to keep men subject to any other authority than that which
emanates from themselves." - Pope Leo XIII, "Humanum Genus"

VATICAN CITY (1985) "The Vatican, clarifying its position on membership
in Masonic lodges, said yesterday that Catholics who join such
organizations commit 'grave sin'. The new reminder, in the Vatican
newspaper L'Osservatore Romano,
appeared to be aimed mainly at Catholics in the United States, where
some have interpreted recent church statements as relaxing the
247-year-old ban on Masonic membership imposed by Pope Clement XII. A
new code of Canon Law outlined on Nov. 25, 1983, omitted membership in
the Masons in the list of offenses that incur automatic
excommunication." - (UPI)

"...The Agency, through some of its priest 'assets' in the Vatican, had
placed six bugging devices in the Secretariat of State, the Vatican
Bank and the Apostolic Palace, where the Pope actually lived and
worked. The devices were sufficiently powerful to enable conversations
to be overheard within rooms with walls thick enough to withstand
artillery-fire. Working from 'safe houses' in high-rise buildings
overlooking the Leonine walls of the tiny city-state, CIA operatives
had recorded often highly confidential discussions about papal plans."The
Agency's surveillance had increased since 5 July 1979, when Walesa
[future president of Poland] telephoned the Pope asking whether John
Paul would approve of the name 'Solidarity' being used
for the fledgling union. Walesa had explained that he had selected the
word from the pontiff's encyclical, 'Redemptor Homis' - a treatise
devoted to the redemption and the dignity of the human race. At its
core had been an appeal for 'acting together'. The significance of
Walesa's request was not lost on the pontiff - or on the 'Department
D's electronic eavesdroppers." - Gordon Thomas, Journey into Madness

The Italian Masonic Lodge P2 "provided a means of furnishing
anti-Communist institutions in Europe and Latin-America with both
Vatican and CIA funds. Calvi [who was found hanging under Blackfriars
Bridge in London in 1982] also claimed that he personally had arranged
the transfer of $20,000,000 of Vatican money to Solidarity in Poland,
although the overall total sent to Solidarity is believed to have
exceeded $100,000,000. Prior to his indictment for murder [of an
Italian investigator], Michele Sindona was not only P2's financier, but
the Vatican's investment counselor as well, helping the church to sell
its Italian assets and re-invest in the United States. His services for
the CIA included passing funds to 'friends' in Yugoslavia, as well as
to the Greek colonels prior to their seizure of power in 1967. He also
channeled millions of dollars into the funds of the Christian Democrats
in Italy."

In March 1981, Italian police raided the villa of Licio Gelli, the
ultra-right leader of P2. Although his files had vanished the index was
discovered. Some of the headings included the Opus Dei, "Giulio
Andreotti, currently Italian Foreign Minister and alleged...to be a
member of the Prieure de Sion.
And they included the organization known officially as the Sovereign
and Military Order of the Temple of Jerusalem - the organization, that
is, which today claims a direct lineal descent from the Knights
Templar." - Baigent, Leigh & Lincoln, The Messianic Legacy

"A list of [P2] members drawn up by Gelli contained the names of nearly
a thousand of Italy's most powerful men. One prosecutor's report later
stated: 'Lodge Propaganda Due is a secret sect that has combined
business and politics with the intention of destroying the country's
constitutional order.'
"Among the names were three members of the Cabinet (including Justice
Minister Adolfo Sarti; several former Prime Ministers including Giulio
Andreotti who had held office between 1972 and 1973 and again between
1976 and 1979; forty-three Members of Parliament; fifty-four top Civil
Servants; 183 army, navy and air force officers including thirty
generals and eight admirals (among them the Commander of the Armed
Forces, Admiral Giovanni Torrisi); nineteen judges; lawyers;
magistrates; carabiniere;
police chiefs; leading bankers; newspaper proprietors, editors and
journalists (including the editor of the country's leading newspaper Il Corriere Della Sera);
fifty-eight university professors; the leaders of several political
parties; and even the directors of the three main intelligence
services.
"All these men, according to the files, had sworn allegiance to Gelli,
and held themselves ready to respond to his call. The 953 names were
divided into seventeen groupings, or cells, each having its own leader.
P2 was so secret and so expertly run by Gelli that even its own members
did not know who belonged to it. Those who know most were the seventeen
cell leaders and they knew only their own grouping."

"Of the many political groupings in Italy, Gelli's files showed that only the Communist Party had no links with P2.""Magistrates
sifting the documents from the Villa Wanda [from whence Gelli had fled]
found hundreds of top secret intelligence documents. Colonel Antonio
Viezzer, the former head of the combined intelligence services, was
identified as the prime source of this material and was arrested in
Rome for spying on behalf of a foreign power.""Fascist, torturer of
partisans in the Second World War, friend and adviser of Peron and
coordinator of right-wing corruption in Italy - was an agent of the
KGB."
"From the beginning Lodge P2 was a KGB-sponsored program aimed at
destablizing Italy, weakening NATO's southern flank, sweeping the
Communists into power in Italy and sending resultant shock waves
throughout the western world." "With
the failure of the ministers, generals and admirals to cooperate with
investigators, "NATO was forced to support the attitude of the corrupt
Freemasons in Italy's armed forces. Officials in Brussels and
Washington suggested discreetly that it was not the right moment to
create a vacuum of power in the Italian army, navy and secret services." - Stephen Knight, The Brotherhood

"The P2 was more than a subversive political organization. The
documents collected by the parliamentary commission show it was a kind
of full-service international organization influencing everything from
arms sales to purchases of crude oil." - Pino Ariacchi, sociologist at the University of Florence

Propaganda Due or P2 was "a lodge originally formed by the
Italian Grand Orient as a lodge of research. In 1975 an Italian fascist
named Licio Gelli was made the Venerable Grand Master of P2, and the
following year that lodge was disavowed and suspended by the Grand
Orient of Italy, so whatever it was, P2 ceased to be an official
Masonic organization.""...Gelli brought in Michele Sindona, the
leading financial advisor to the Vatican. Then, in 1977, Sindona
brought in Roberto Calvi, head of the Banco Ambrosiano in Milan, which
was closely associated with the papal bank, one of its major
shareholders....Calvi brought to the table his most valued contact, the
Instituto per lo Opere di Religione, the Institute for
Religious Works (the 'IOR'), a financial institution often erroneously
referred to as the 'Vatican bank'. The IOR belongs not to the Vatican
city-state, but to the pope alone.""...The Banco Ambrosiano helped
to set up foreign shell companies, including ten in Panama, which were
controlled by the papal bank. Then the Banco Ambrosiano loaned these
shells up to one and a third billion dollars. The papal bank also put
in funds of its own, but not one in Rome will even hint at the amount
or purpose of these extensive fundings."

When Archbishop Marcinkus, head of the IOR, invoked the Italian Concordat
which guarantees Vatican sovereignty "when he learned he had been
indicted by the Italian government." This decision was backed up by the
Italian Supreme Court. "...The papal bank agreed to pay and paid over
to the Banco Ambrosiano the incredible sum of 244 million dollars,
while denying any guilt, or even any material involvement, in the great
fraud. Together with the reputed loss of 450 million dollars, this
means that the affairs between the papal bank and the Banco Ambrosiano
cost the Catholic church almost 700 million dollars, over ten times the
1987 operating loss that Catholics all over the world were asked to
make up with extra donations..." - John J. Robinson, Born in the Blood

In late 1983, "the pontiff had recently sent Archbishop Luigi Poggi to
Moscow to begin secret discussions in the Kremlin on the prospect of
coming to a mutually acceptable accommodation over Poland: the pontiff
would control Walesa if the Church was given more freedom." - Gordon Thomas, Journey into Madness

"Though they are originated and resident in
Italy, though they have the same duties and pay the taxes like all, the
Italian Freemasons doesn't have the same rights: no more they can
aspire to hold offices in a public bureau throughout the Italy, like
the rest of the Italian citizens. It is the amazing conclusion of the
junta of the region Marche: from the August 1996 a Freemason can work
no more in the Marche's public bureaus and neither propose to hold in
them any role."
"Italian Republic guarantees for whole the citizens the right to work
(Clause 4 of the Italian Constitution), but the Marche's regional
junta, which evidently retains of have ideas clearer than the
constituent Fathers, has concluded that the Freemasons are not citizens
like all the others, and therefore they could not aspire to equal
right. In this region, from the fatidical 5 August 1996, it is
necessary declare a "no membership in Masonic Lodges" for compete to a
function in a local public bureau."

"These sinister, grim aspects have not escaped
to any deputies of the Italian Parliament, that have presented an
interpellation to the government on the manifest unconstitutionality of
the Marche's law. The law, they affirm in the interpellation,
"constitutes a serious damage to the liberty of thought and of
association, guaranteed from our Constitution, and the equality of
whole the citizens in front of the law; it seems instead that the
Marche legislator has retained that the membership to a Masonic Lodge
is equivalent tout court to be on trial or be condemned". - Maurizio Nicosia, WM Felsinea # 846, Grande Oriente d'Italia.